Desert Solitaire: A Season in the Wilderness

When Desert Solitaire was first published in 1968, it became the focus of a nationwide cult. Rude and sensitive. Thought-provoking and mystical. Angry and loving. Both Abbey and this book are all of these and more. Here, the legendary author of The Monkey Wrench Gang, Abbey's Road and many other critically acclaimed books vividly captures the essence of his life during three seasons as a park ranger in southeastern Utah.

All the Wild That Remains: Edward Abbey, Wallace Stegner, and the American West

Archetypal wild man Edward Abbey and proper, dedicated Wallace Stegner left their footprints all over the western landscape. Now, the award-winning nature writer David Gessner follows the ghosts of these two remarkable writer-environmentalists - from Stegner's birthplace in Saskatchewan to the site of Abbey's pilgrimages to Arches - braiding their stories and asking how they speak to the lives of all those who care about the West. What is the future of a region beset by droughts and fires, by fracking and drilling?

Dead Run: The Murder of a Lawman and the Greatest Manhunt of the Modern American West

On a sunny May morning in 1998 in Cortez, Colorado, three desperados in a stolen truck opened fire on the town cop, shooting him 20 times; then they blasted their way past dozens of police cars and disappeared into 10,000 square miles of the harshest wilderness terrain on the North American continent. Self-trained survivalists, the outlaws eluded the most sophisticated law enforcement technology on the planet and a pursuit force that represented more than 75 local, state, and federal police agencies with dozens of SWAT teams, U.S. Army Special Forces....

The Emerald Mile: The Epic Story of the Fastest Ride in History through the Heart of the Grand Canyon

From one of Outside magazine's "Literary All-Stars" comes the thrilling true tale of the fastest boat ride ever, down the entire length of the Colorado River and through the Grand Canyon, during the legendary flood of 1983. In the spring of 1983, massive flooding along the length of the Colorado River confronted a team of engineers at the Glen Canyon Dam with an unprecedented emergency that may have resulted in the most catastrophic dam failure in history.

The Last Season

Destined to become a classic of adventure literature, The Last Season examines the extraordinary life of legendary backcountry ranger Randy Morgenson and his mysterious disappearance in California's unforgiving Sierra Nevada - mountains as perilous as they are beautiful. Eric Blehm's masterful work is a gripping detective story interwoven with the riveting biography of a complicated, original, and wholly fascinating man.

Beyond the Hundredth Meridian: John Wesley Powell and the Second Opening of the West

Pulitzer Prize winner Wallace Stegner recounts the remarkable career of Major John Wesley Powell, the distinguished ethnologist and geologist who explored the Colorado River, the Grand Canyon, and the homeland of the Southwest Indian tribes. This classic work is a penetrating and insightful study of the Powell’s career, from the beginning of the Powell Survey, in which Powell and his men famously became the first to descend the Colorado River, to his eventual expulsion from the Geological Survey.

Let My People Go Surfing: The Education of a Reluctant Businessman - Including 10 More Years of Business Unusual

In his long-awaited memoir, Yvon Chouinard - legendary climber, businessman, environmentalist, and founder of Patagonia, Inc. - shares the persistence and courage that have gone into being head of one of the most respected and environmentally responsible companies on earth. From his youth as the son of a French Canadian blacksmith to the thrilling, ambitious climbing expeditions that inspired his innovative designs for the sport's equipment.

The Hour of Land: A Personal Topography of America's National Parks

For years, America's national parks have provided public breathing spaces in a world in which such spaces are steadily disappearing, which is why close to 300 million people visit the parks each year. Now, to honor the centennial of the National Park Service, Terry Tempest Williams, the author of the beloved memoir When Women Were Birds, returns with The Hour of Land, a literary celebration of our national parks, what they mean to us, and what we mean to them.

My First Summer in the Sierra

It was June of 1869 when John Muir reluctantly accepted a job herding sheep from the central valley of California to the headwaters of the Merced and Tuolumne Rivers, high into the Sierra Nevadas and deep into the Yosemite region. He felt ill equipped for the work, and yet the opportunity thrilled his adventurous spirit. With a notebook tied to his belt, he set out for a summer he would never forget. My First Summer in the Sierra is Muir’s classic account of that extraordinary journey.

The Exploration of the Colorado River and Its Canyons

The great unknown of the Southwest is conquered by a one-armed man and his crew of adventurers, placing the Colorado River and the Grand Canyon on the map of the American continent. It is a journey no human being had ever made before. Dangerous rapids, narrow canyon walls offering no escape, terrifying river waterfalls, capsized boats, near drowning, lost equipment and disillusioned men are dramatically described by John Wesley Powell, leader of this adventurous party.

The Big Rock Candy Mountain

Bo Mason, his wife, and his two boys live a transient life of poverty and despair. Drifting from town to town and from state to state, the violent, ruthless Bo seeks his fortune in the hotel business, in new farmland, and, eventually, in illegal rum-running throughout the treacherous back roads of the American Northwest.

The Dharma Bums

Two ebullient young men are engaged in a passionate search for dharma, or truth. Their major adventure is the pursuit of the Zen way, which takes them climbing into the high Sierras to seek the lesson of solitude - a lesson that has a hard time surviving their forays into the pagan groves of San Francisco's bohemia, with its marathon wine-drinking bouts, poetry jam sessions, experiments in "yabyum", and other non-ascetic pastimes.

Blue Highways: A Journey into America

Hailed as a masterpiece of American travel writing, Blue Highways is an unforgettable journey along our nation's backroads. William Least Heat-Moon set out with little more than the need to put home behind him and a sense of curiosity about "those little towns that get on the map-if they get on at all-only because some cartographer has a blank space to fill: Remote, Oregon; Simplicity, Virginia; New Freedom, Pennsylvania; New Hope, Tennessee; Why, Arizona; Whynot, Mississippi." His adventures, his discoveries, and his recollections of the extraordinary people he encountered along the way amount to a revelation of the true American experience.

A Passion for Nature: The Life of John Muir

"I am hopelessly and forever a mountaineer," John Muir wrote. "Civilization and fever and all the morbidness that has been hooted at me has not dimmed my glacial eye, and I care to live only to entice people to look at Nature's loveliness. My own special self is nothing". In Donald Worster's magisterial biography, John Muir's "special self" is fully explored as is his extraordinary ability, then and now, to get others to see the sacred beauty of the natural world.

Alone on the Wall

Only a few years ago, Alex Honnold was little known beyond a small circle of hardcore climbers. Today, at the age of 30, he is probably the most famous adventure athlete in the world. In that short time, he has proven his expertise in many styles of climbing and has shattered speed records, pioneered routes, and won awards within each discipline. More spectacularly still, he has pushed the most extreme and dangerous form of climbing far beyond the limits of what anyone thought was possible.

Silent Spring

First published in 1962, Silent Spring can single-handedly be credited with sounding the alarm and raising awareness of humankind's collective impact on its own future through chemical pollution. No other book has so strongly influenced the environmental conscience of Americans and the world at large.

Angle of Repose

Wallace Stegner's uniquely American classic centers on Lyman Ward, a noted historian who relates a fictionalized biography of his pioneer grandparents at a time when he has become estranged from his own family. Through a combination of research, memory, and exaggeration, Ward voices ideas concerning the relationship between history and the present, art and life, parents and children, and husbands and wives.

Finding Everett Ruess: The Life and Unsolved Disappearance of a Legendary Wilderness Explorer

Finding Everett Ruess is the definitive biography of the artist, writer, and eloquent celebrator of the wilderness whose bold solo explorations of the American West and mysterious disappearance in the Utah desert at age 20 have earned him a large and devoted cult following.

Publisher's Summary

Ex-Green Beret George Hayduke has returned from war to find his beloved southwestern desert threatened by industrial development. Joining with Bronx exile and feminist saboteur Bonnie Abzug, wilderness guide and outcast Mormon Seldom Seen Smith, and libertarian billboard torcher Doc Sarvis, M.D., Hayduke is ready to fight the power - taking on the strip miners, clear-cutters, and the highway, dam, and bridge builders who are threatening the natural habitat. The Monkey Wrench Gang is on the move - and peaceful coexistence be damned!

I have loved this book since it was first published. I was in college in Colorado, and my friends and I used to go regularly to Utah to jeep and backpack in Canyonlands, Arches, etc. and also to Arizona. I have read it quite a few times, the first few times during trips to the canyon country, where we would do our best to trace the footsteps of the Gang. If you love the desert and have any anarchistic tendencies, The Monkey Wrench Gang is for you!

The audiobook is pretty good. The narrator was OK but nothing special. He pronounced "pinyon" (a word that occurs many, many times) as "pin-YOWN". I think this might be one of the acceptable pronunciations, but I have never heard anyone in the Southwest say anything other than "PIN-yuhn" so I found it distracting. Maybe I'm being unfair, but I found it distracting. Hayduke never would have pronounced it that way, and I doubt that Ed Abbey would have either.

I spend 90+ minutes a day in my car, Audible makes it enjoyable regardless of what's happening in traffic. My taste varies from endurance fitness to economics and from to combat stories and romance novels.

I remember reading this book almost 20 years ago and falling in love with the characters. Abbey's writing style is one in a million and his experiences in the desert southwest make his works priceless if you've ever hiked in Utah or Arizona. Abbey develops characters with so much texture and grit that it gets stuck between your teeth like desert sand. The Monkey Wrench Gang has you cheering for the bad guys and hoping the good guys go veering off the road into the great abyss.

I only hope that Audible follows up one of these days and makes Hayduke Lives available on audiobook.

this is an excellent fun caper very much in the vein of Westlake and his comic crime novels. the tone and voice is very much Westlake. I thoroughly enjoyed it. It has a very topical theme with the environmentalist sabotage but the novel is well written with sly asides and jabs and there are many intelligent allusions to literature and conventions along the way.

What about Michael Kramer’s performance did you like?

another reason I enjoyed it is Kramer's narration. he has been a favorite of mine since i first ran across him listening to Westlake titles he narrated for Books on Tape. I hope those recordings will some day be available on Audible also as they are excellent. he narrated most of the Dortmunder series which is great as well as other Westlakes. his voice coupled with this story threw me into a state of deja vu and nostalgia for those titles. he is a narrator that is perfect for this style of fun sly fiction and i hope this means he will show up in many other titles.

What an incredible book. I found that oscillating between reading the physical book and listening to this audiobook was a pleasant combination. Edward Abbey's extensive vocabulary is best enjoyed printed, allowing the reading opportunities for deeper comprehension and inquiry. This audiobook, with great and dynamic narration, offers the opportunity for the sense of storytelling. I enjoyed the different voices used for each character and was able to refer back to them when picking up the book in between sessions of listening.

Great story. His discription of many wild places and the energy of the moment when experiencing raw moments in nature were perfect. I great story of man vs the often selfish and cruel people who drive industry. I loved the book. Hayduke lives!

If you could sum up The Monkey Wrench Gang in three words, what would they be?

Eco-terrorism Reigns Dear

Who was your favorite character and why?

George Hayduke is too obvious. I enjoyed Bonnie Abzug balancing the attentions of two men simultaneously while bringing her female perspective to every escapade.

What about Michael Kramer’s performance did you like?

You eventually accept his personal characterizations of the player's voices.

Did you have an extreme reaction to this book? Did it make you laugh or cry?

Knew of this book for forty years but hadn't read it. As a younger man, it could have inspired eco-anarchy in me .

Any additional comments?

Edward Abbey is particularly adept at describing the southwest landscape. I live in Tucson, Arizona. During the late 1970's and into the 1980's bumper stickers that said "Hayduke LIves!" were common in the area. One can occasionally find one... even today.

Alt-political philosophy plus wildness adventures plus oddball characters made this entertaining. I wasn't crazy about the voices used for Doc and Bonnie, but I got over it. After reading The Iron Heel, I felt like I was reading the story of the machine breakers, and their pointless efforts were all pre described by Jack London. The stories of the west and the unique troupe made up for it and kept my interest throughout.